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Topic: question from a friend I know (Read 3651 times)

I know a guy in New Jersy that just asked me this question "i have bees (look like bumble bees) that keep boring holes in the wooden gazebo type thing in my yard...i hate killing them and keep puttying over holes when they are out bt would like to know what i can do to keep them away in the first place" he said they bore completely round holes into wood is there a way to keep them off the wood or away?

Actully I have a funny story about carpander bees. I was off at a shooting range in the middle of nowhere; typical palmetto and sand with a few pine trees. One kid picks up a 22calaber riffle, drops it, loaded and it goes off shooting a large 4 by 4 holding up part of the roof. I swear the second he did that dozens of bees came flying out various holes (now I shall exadurate) with a buzz louder than the gunshot. This is completely irrelevent!

Carpenter bees were a big problem when I lived in SC. One day I was sitting on the patio and I heard what sounded like a mouse chewing. Came to find out it was carpenter bees eating up my patio furniture, while I was sitting in it!

I asked around and found only one thing that worked: paint or stain the patio furniture every spring. They don't like chewing through the finish, they like raw wood. Never had a problem again.

I live in a log cabin... need I say more? These darn bees like the logs that extend to create my porch roof. It is amazing that they chew holes that are perfectly round and all the same size. The precision they have is not unlike our girls in the hive. The holes are a uniform diameter (about 8 to 12 mm) and are so round I have people ask why I "drilled" the holes in the logs.

I have heard of people using borax to keep them at bay, and some finishes keep them out. This year my infestation is not too bad, but to look at the sawdust and droppings on the porch, you would think there is a wood working convention going on! They can cause significant damage over the years.

carpenter bees are extremely tenacious insects, that are attracted to raw wood. painting the wood with oil base paints, several coats, after you have treated the holes in the wood with a residual dust labeled for carpenter bees, and also plugging the holes may deter them until the paint wears, when you will need to re-apply more paint. of course, through all this you are removing that wonderful raw wood look that appeals to you and the bees. when treating the holes, do it at night, they will all be in there, just like honeybees in their hives. Another option would be to let them do their thing and then replace whatever they're infesting with treated wood. In viewing wooden overhangs over the last 15 yrs, while conducting wood destroying insect reports, I rarely see carpenter bee evidence in good quality treated lumber.

Carpenter bees look like bumble bees except their abdomen is shiny black instead of fuzzy like a bumble bee. They can do quite a bit of damage in a short time, especially if you have a major infestation.

The thing to use on them is boric acid. This product comes in many brand names and many mediums. If you want to kill them in their nest (hole) there is a white powdered boric acid product that you use in a whiff bottle. You shake the powder in the plastic bottle and then squeeze (or whiff) it into the hole. This will kill them in the hole, then you can plug the hole safely and not have them bore their way out.

If you want for them not to bore the holes in the first place, but you like the look of your unpainted wood, there is a boric acid liquid product that you can mix and apply with a hudson sprayer ( the kind you pump up and then spray with a nozzle that you hold in your hand ). This product will not color your wood but will leave a "crystaline" residue on the surface of the wood so the surface will apear to shine especially in the sun. Re-application is obviously necessary every year or every other year depending on the severity of the weather. We use this product on our 300 year old museum building for carpenter bees, as well as powderpost beetles and carpenter ants. :D

Logged

By the rude bridge that arched the floodTheir flag to Aprils breeze unfurledHere once the embattled farmers stoodAnd fired the shot heard round the world-Emerson

Jay, I can only assume that the product you're mentioning that crystalizes on the surface is either timbor or bora-care. Both have the same active ingredient. Boracare has sugar alcohols that enable it to penetrate wood deeply. Both products are made by a company called Nissus. Their tests indicate that these products do not work particularly well against carpenter bees. Once these products dry, there is no residue which could get on the carpenter bees when they enter & exit their bored holes. The reason these products don't work that well against the bees, is that carpenter bees don't ingest wood, & in order for those products to be effective the bees would have to consume it. This is why residual dusts work best, because the bees will injest the dust when trying to remove it off of their bodies.

They are pretty aggressive too, if I remember my encounters with them correctly.

Actually, I don't have a problem with aggression with them. They more or less just fly around you. They are big enough to unnerve just about anyone though if they are close enough. We have a ton of them here, and never have an aggression problem. There is one under my shed that my wife an I thought was a hummingbird at first it was so large.

Regardless, they don't do too much damage, but the years do take a toll. And they are solitary, so if you don't treat your wood, it is a one by one issue.